Are You feeling sad? I am too: 4 flavors of launcher mom sadness
All three of my kids graduated in the span of five years, and what surprised me most was the conflicted, complicated, slippery sadness I felt.
I knew my kids loved me.
I have a good marriage.
I had friends and co-workers that I enjoyed.
My extended family is local, and we get together often.
But I still felt enormously sad.
Sadness in this launching season of life is complicated. It competes with our heart-felt desire to support our kids. Their leaving accomplishes our main objective. Being sad about It feels disloyal and kind of like a party-pooper. As moms, we quickly add asterisks to every sad comment, “But I actually feel super proud and happy.” We say from behind our wet tissues.
So we don’t examine our sadness too hard. We tamp it down and try not to listen to any sad songs. We don’t want to take it out and look at it because, well, that’s painful and I would rather just “move forward” thanks.
But, sometimes the sadness refuses to go away. It doesn’t pack up and leave when we shove it in the closet and close the door. Turns out, it does push ups and gets stronger instead. Maybe it erupts as road rage in traffic or a persistent migraine or nights of interrupted sleep.
Can you relate? As all three of my kids graduated and did different things, I felt all manner of sadness in varying degrees and at varying times. I find that naming what I am feeling helps me see it and understand it better. It helps to be specific about what flavor of sadness I was feeling.
Here are the biggest four chunks of what my mom-sadness felt like as my kids graduated and started on new paths.
Maybe you feel a piece of these too.
I felt left behind. Other posts will prove that I am desperately proud of my kids. But that doesn’t change the fact that I have devoted my life to these three humans, and all the sudden, their plans did not include me. Most days that was fine. Some days I felt discarded. They were going and doing and having adventures. I was still in my routine of home and work and laundry and grocery. I always said that I wanted to be a stable platform for them to launch from. Still, even though I wanted it to go like this, their leaving opened up a hole. We can compare notes on where the hole is located. Some moms feel it in their chest. I always felt it in my gut. Feeling left behind meant I felt like my kids were moving forward, and I was standing still and getting smaller and smaller in their rear-view mirrors. As if I am part of their past, and whether I will be part of their future remains to be seen.
I felt invisible. So much of what I do is in the background. It is a quiet, steady beat that measures out the rhythm of our family. Dishes in the sink that I wash and dry and put away. Piles of clothes or shoes or charging cords delivered to different rooms because only mom knows whose are whose. Groceries that magically appear in the fridge or the pantry. My kids and my husband make every effort to notice and be grateful. No one is purposefully overlooking me. But mundane activities have a tendency to make one feel unseen.
I felt like my affection was unreciprocated. Not all the time. But sometimes. I was the clingy girlfriend, texting too much, calling too often, asking too many questions. I would ask my husband, am I being obnoxious? Because I honestly lost my ability to discern. How do I know what communicates “I love you” and “I want to be a part of your life”? And at what point does it switch to, “I am a helicopter mom who might come sit outside your apartment?” I second guessed every line of every text I sent. Should I end with a heart emoji? Is that too middle school? Did they text back? Hmmm, just the dreaded “OK”. Sigh.
I felt unneeded. Literature loves heroes falling from their pedestals. I feel that pain. I used to be the hero for my kids. The answer to every problem. The solution to all their needs. This was at the very beginning, and if I am being honest there is some revisionist history going on here. I may look back on it fondly, but, in real life, I did not love being needed all. the. time. However, I do enjoy being the occasional hero. The one who can find all the lost things. The one who can soothe the bad dreams at night. The one who remembers every detail. I like to feel needed, and I felt that I had done my job of raising independent people too well.
When I study my sadness as a Launcher Mom, those are my four main aches:
feeling left behind,
feeling invisible,
feeling unrequited
and feeling unneeded.
I value vulnerability and honesty, so let me show my cards and open my messy heart to you. Maybe you will read this and be relieved that it isn’t just you. Maybe you will recognize your own sad launcher mom heart in mine and feel a little less alone and a little more seen.
There is an added benefit, an extra bonus to being specific about what I feel.
Being specific about the flavor of my sadness gives me a cheat code.
If I label my feelings as generally “sad” then I am going to look around for things to make me generally “happy” -- puppy videos on Facebook, taking a hike, watching “Only Murders in the Building”. All good things, but they won’t hit the mark. Because when I know that my sadness is more accurately “feeling left behind” then I can say “Yes” to the offer of concert tickets or sign up for an art class I have been eyeing. The more precise I can be about the ache in my heart, the better I am at finding the correct size and shape of things to soothe it.
